Scarlet Silken Spiderweb
by talking cockerel
Summary: The darker the secret the deeper the lies the more desperate, the more insane, the truths. For Kaname and Zero, illusion and reality blur into a psychedelic, swinging horror. Yaoi, rewritten.
1. Part 1

A/N : Hello all! This incomplete story has long been on hiatus due to a lack of time, effort and creativity. I'm so sorry! Coming back to Spiderweb, however, has given me different ideas about this little fic - changes have been made to the plot and the genre, it's now more of horror and drama than romance as it was previously.

Enjoy!

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(You'll figure this out soon enough)

_~Italics~ : Zero_

_Italics : Kaname_

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Zero Kiryuu was no fool.

And yet, here he was, a solitary pale moth flitting silently down the corridor of the Moon Dormitory, running to the impressive bronze double doors that lead to the room of the vampires' feared lord – Kaname Kuran.

He walked briskly, stepping a little too quickly – as though the moth was unwilling to stay still, uneasy, wary of becoming a predator's target. It was midnight.

Dead leaves, blown through the windows, skittered across the floor in the slight draught with a soft cackling that made the hairs rise unbidden on the back of Zero's neck. Kiriyuu forced himself to stare straight ahead, but the more he focused on the doors in front, the more his peripheries seem to blur, rendering slinking, sliding shadows on either side of him.

_~Dearest Zero_.~

In an instant where the Zero's vision was restricted to the bronze and mahogany panels of two doors in front of him, the air thrummed and thickened, stirred with the presence of unseen peoples, just out of his sight. Wild was the beating of the hunter's heart; wild with fear, and wild with madness; wild under the gaze of their baleful eyes.

_~Dearest Zero, dearest brother, my beloved brother, my own blood, my sweet blood, your sweet eyes, your flesh and blood, the smile on your lips, the blood on your lips, my lips on your lips, your sweet smile on sweet lips, my lips to you, the blood in your smile, my smile at your blood, your sweet blood, your sweet lips, my sweet smile at your sweet blood, my sweet blood, my dear blood, my dear brother, beloved brother - ~_

He quailed for a moment on the threshold of the two worlds. In this world, specters were as thick as lies; but take a step into the lair of this king of demons, and they would flee – of this vampire prince's madness and power, they were wiser than he.

_~Dearest Zero. ~_

He flung the doors open, and the voices withdrew; he found Kaname. He was languidly arrogant as always, raven locks pooling, the half buttoned shirt flaunting his chiseled ridges of his collarbones and chest, even the rise and fall of his breathing was sensuous. Sprawled on the sofa like a deity incarnate.

_A deity sprawled on the red ground, horror incarnate; helpless, immobile, and in pain. Paralysis, torment, the graze of cold fingers on his ribs, between his ribs, sliding about his lungs, touching his warm, beating heart with dead fingers. _

"You choose the most ungodly times to appear, Kiryuu." Kaname opened an eye, showed the tips of his fangs in a small grin, and closed it again. _The fingers curled around his heart, unyielding as iron. _

In an explosion of movement, Zero closed the distance between them; he grabbed the front of his Kaname's shirt and bodily heaved him to his feet.

"Explain. Now!" A metallic click, and Kaname felt the cold tip of the Bloody Rose dig into his side, and pale violet eyes inches from his own, shimmering with suppressed wrath and vengeance.

_The fingers constricted, tightened, stilling the swell of his heart as it beat to fuel his body. Still immobile, paralysed. _

The pureblood smiled, tossed his head. Unintimidated by the gun, dismissing the threat with distressing ease.

"Why this animosity? I did the job of taking a pureblood's life, prevented your needlessly tossing your freedom away. Thank me for saving you from a lifetime of captivity, Kiriyu. Life at the mercy of the Ancient Thirteen is beyond human imagination."

_The fingers closed around his heart, the hand yanked as though on a bell pull. The hand removed itself from his body, clutching a dripping, pulsating mass. _

The gun moved from his waist to his temple, unwavering and steady as the pale purple glare. The click of a loaded barrel was accompanied by the faint whiff of silver.

"Shizuka Hiou was mine to kill!" Zero snarled.

_Too late. _

_He opened his eyes blearily, feeling in his limbs a stiffness that had nothing to do with the cold floor, and everything to do with death. He could feel a new heart growing from his aorta and vena cava. It was painful, this hard intrusion pushing up beneath the lungs that had collapsed, like soggy wet bags, in the absence of oxygen. He could see the shape of his chest swelling to steeper convex as his ribs were pushed back into place by inflated lungs. He hated this process, this growing of a new heart. _

_Had the gods seen fit to teach him a lesson? How very ironic, fitting, then, that one as cruel as he was forced to spend the remainder of his life growing a new heart. _

_Immortality?_

_The sheer vitality and strength of his blood, such healing and resilience against death; a perfect mockery now. _

_Too weak to live, to want to endure with this endless excruciating agony, measured not in days but in deaths. But too strong to die._

_His heart pumped more strongly as the layers of cardiovascular tissue regenerated. Blood that had cooled and pooled in his muscles was forced into movement by the pumping action of his heart, bringing warmth to his extremities. With the wakefulness came the memory of pain, and the renewing of fear, soon the abominable, cold, loathsome groping hands would come, holding him down, plunging through his flesh to take his heart. After he died – or went into coma, whichever it was – he would awake with a new and growing heart, to live another short life of dread and terror before the hands came again. And again. And again. And again. Again and again countlessly. No end. _

"Yours to kill? Not now… and besides, Kiriyuu..." Kaname leaned in close, pushing against the gun held at his head,

"She _wanted _you. And I…I don't like sharing my possessions."

Zero recoiled, bristling with outrage.

"I belong to nobody, least of all you," he hissed, insulted. Kaname shook his head, still wearing that cold, condescending smile.

"You would do well to listen and learn, Kiryuu…put aside your human self for awhile and consider us.

"Shizuka and I, both heirs to the oldest and most powerful families, have always dominated the pureblood scene. Our dance is a ruthless tango of blood and power that has lasted for years, and finally I have vanquished Shizuka. She has been outdone, left the stage as nought but sparkling pearls of dust…

"In return I gain what any vampire would desire most – the untainted elixir of our existence, a pureblood's life and flesh.

"And in doing so, Zero Kiryuu … I have happened on…" a sensual sideways tilt of his head and an arched neck, a light lift of the haughty black brows;

"…a very interesting … toy…" Moonlight drizzled through the window, and Kaname's moving closer made shadows shift hauntingly over his features.

"What it is in you that drove Shizuka Hiou to obsession?"

There was a harsh sibilant hiss in the last word that rasped like steel in Kaname's voice, and Zero could neither miss it, nor could he explain why it provoked, on some innate level of animalism, his arousal; yet he stood still, a willing captive to lust's binding chains. The furor of curiosity and desire smouldered in his eyes, like a forest fire silhouetted against the moon.

Kaname took a full step back, crossed his arms about his chest, and eyed Zero appraisingly. For a moment both their gazes were narrowed to a single, undivided attention between mahogany, half lidded irises and sparkling purple eyes.

Then Kaname spoke, a single dizzying word that spun around Zero's mind – like a kite in a gale, a leaf in the storm – just its boldness, the authority, left him breathless –

"Undress."

_No matter how many times he re-lived, he was still in the same place, condemned by sin to this glass coffin, glass indestructible as adamantium - this transparent trap of perdition, sinking through a sea of blood; a deep crimson streaked with dull brick red whirled through with a lush velvet burgundy, so many lives of mortals unfolding before him in these churning, roiling, scarlet depths. The mortals – how he envied them!- he had used to achieve this accursed immortality._

_Every now and then a pale white shadow ghosted through the blood. Sometimes it was a hand, or the flat front of a belly. The dead corpses of his victims swimming in their own blood. How much blood he had spilt. _

_Something white swam up, pressed itself against the other side of the glass wall, grinning insanely at him. _

_Shizuka Hiou, who had looked angelic in real life, was nothing short of perfection in death. Perfection, that is, of a different kind. She was grinning like a hyena after carrion, mouth stretched to impossible proportions. And that hole in her heart, through which her heart had been ripped, still ghastly and empty, with blood coursing through it like water through a pipe. He backed up fearfully as the corpse of Shizuka drifted off the wall. _

Zero's shaking fingers rose to the clasp of the jacket, then he paused. His trembling stilled. He fingered the smooth edged buttons teasingly, accidentally-on-purpose missing the button hole. The taut, thin line that was his lips relaxed and, for the first time, twisted into a mocking, lopsided sneer that –

"Faster."

_No matter how fast it was, he could never put it off. It would come again – the binding of his limbs. The paralysis. _

The sharp, callous command was tight with impatience and displeasure. Zero's confidence faltered, and he began to pull nervously at the buttons of his shirt.

He didn't move fast enough.

Kaname extended one long hand, fingers touching the milky white skin of Zero's chest; in a swift, ruthless movement, slashed downwards, tearing the thin fabric off and away and leaving only a silk magenta tie. Zero's eyes widened; his fists clenched as he unconsciously held his breath, backing away slowly.

_The hands. The hands. The cold hands. The ruthless hands. Shizuka's hands, seeking vengeance for the warm organ that had been torn from their mistress, seeking to replace their eternal lost with this immortal's heart. _

"I detest inexperience." Kaname shoved him away, turning his back as if disgusted by his unease. "The scent of greenness clings to you like that of spring about a newly born lamb!"

"Don't go–" Zero begged, his words deceptive, for his actions were anything but meek. He grabbed Kaname's shoulder and spun him around, dragged him close till their bodies were pressed against each other.

"I'm a fast learner," he breathed.

"We'll see," Kaname replied.

_The fingers tightened, inexorably, and tore out his heart. In agony beyond articulation, racked with deep despair, Kaname screamed a silent scream. _

End of Chapter 1

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My first time treading in the horror department, so any constructive criticism is deserved and welcome! Please leave a review =) Thank you!


	2. Part 2

A/N : Thank you so much for all your reviews and comments, for the original stories as well as for this new one! Such encouragements go a long way in helping a writer to improve, so if there is anything you'd like to point out, please don't hesitate! Thank you!

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Zero snarled, and all of sudden he stepped forward with outstretched claws, only to be knocked back by Kaname; undeterred, he whipped out the Bloody Rose, and the pureblood snatched it from his grasp, tossed it far away –

– they leapt for the twin swords that were displayed on Kaname's wall. Both blades were a little dusty, but light and well balanced –

- They struck out at each other, swift and sure as dueling serpents; the sharp peal of impact and the harsh draconic hiss of metal on metal, the tremor of straining muscles magnified in the vibrating steel blades – their bodies awoke on a plane they had never known –

- and then they were curling away, spinning like butterflies in the breeze, in this ballet of hate and desire – Zero was lost in its tale; his eyes weren't seeing, his ears weren't hearing, his heart wasn't even beating – but how clearly he felt it, this inexplicable intense hunger –

- together, apart, together, apart, and together once more, each clash a struggle for dominance – The pace stepped up, and Zero gave ground almost gracefully, his nubile white flesh rippling and elongating as he blocked and ducked and back stepped.

Now the wall was at his back, and Kaname had him by the throat at sword point. Kaname jerked his head, and Zero's sword fell from tight, nerveless fingers; he had been fighting for his life just now. His life, and … something else.

Kaname moved the sword down, from his throat to his abdomen, above Zero's navel, leaving a long red line. Zero met his mahogany gaze boldly, challenging those lush depths with a simmering exuberance of his own.

"Scared to continue, kuran?"

In answer, the purebood picked a magenta bottle from a shelf, dropping his sword.

"Drink," Kaname said, pressing the tip of the bottle to Zeros's lips. The hunter tasted it tentatively. It tasted a little like wine, but it wasn't the normal, fruity scent of the human grape drink that lingered on his tongue. . .

_~Running, the continuous cursive flow, darting from point to point, the endless search for respite from delirium. These crazed rabid voices, hideous and hackling like the howls of hyenas. __Dearest, dearest…dearest…the fading echo drove him onward, further into the dark and deep. ~_

"Finish it." Steel fingers encircled his shoulder, clamping him close; when Kaname upended the bottle into his mouth, the rich infusion of not-wine overrode his self restraint and before he could register the frenzied gulps, there was nothing left but the lingering hint of salt and iron in his mouth.

_~Horror sang like the unhinged shriek of violins. ~_

Zero had no time to curse his lack of control. The liquid burnt like fire in his throat, a sharp knife slicing from his throat to his belly. He bent over and gagged, clawing at his stomach as though he could still the snake writhing within him.

_~He was on his knees, clutching, in his palm, a blinking eyeball. His own right eyeball had fallen out of its socket and into his hands, and the remaining eyeball in his left socket was widened in horrified stupefaction, stared uncomprehendingly at its displaced brother; at the one object it was never, ever supposed to look at. ~_

"Doesn't agree with your human body, does it? I suppose it is an acquired taste."

Zero shook his head violently, trying to clear his tearing eyes.

"Blood of a newborn human, taken before the babe reaches its first month of age, before the food of mankind, tainted with chemicals and pollution, passes its lips. The infant is bled fully conscious, squalling and wailing, till what little it has is completely drained, and the body is tossed aside as carrion for the vultures or manure for the soil.

"Each bottle", Kaname continued placidly, as though explaining the contents of a medicine, "is created at the cost of one innocent life."

A moment's silence, then a terrible revelation. Zero stumbled away from Kaname, horrified. Reflex had made him gag; horror now made him breathless with shock.

_~He fought the urges that overwhelmed him, denied his body of the needed fresh blood, refusing to descend into cannibalism. The mind is stronger than the body, he told himself. ~_

_~It was, ironically, sickeningly, literally, true.~_

_~They grey scales had started at his fingertips. He had thought it odd at first, the greyish tinge to his nails as they spread up his fingers, on one hand first, then the other. Gradually he realized that he was loosing sensation in the grey coloured areas, and he realized that without replacement, his own blood was insufficient to nourish his body fully. A layer of flaky, dusty grey replaced his taut skin. ~_

_~Hence the gradual death of his flesh, and the growing grey patches as his flesh died little by little. He could still use his fingers and hands, oddly enough; it was just that they felt nothing, they were numb and nerveless; nothing more than flesh coloured nubs. His nails chipped off and didn't hurt. Neither did they grow back. He bruised his forearm and the blue black remained there, not fading. When it spread to his chest, though, he had started to panic. Several of his teeth felt wobbly, and Zero took care not to jar them out of his mouth.~_

_~In the beginning, it had been easy to wear long sleeves, jackets pulled low over his gray hands to hide it. Later was not so easy; soon, the grey spread to his face, bringing a deathly pallor to his already pale complexion. His lips were a rubbery pair of lifeless slugs, his tongue a sandy, doughy appendage with neither taste nor touch. He was like a living zombie, and many exclaimed at how – 'tired' he looked. 'Drained', 'stretched'. ~_

_~If only they knew. His hair was falling in clumps of brittle white straw. One day he had awoken to realize one of eyelids were totally devoid of eye lashes. And now a low hanging brunch had smacked his eyeball clean out of its socket. It was surprisingly un-jelly-like. Like holding an egg. And the pupil – a pale purple embryo. The retinal nerve of the eyeball in his palm extended like a grey wrinkled noodle.~_

_~Fazed, he tried to cram the eyeball back in. He blinked. His vision was still one dimensional, and the limp nerve end flopped out of his eye socket like a dead worm. ~_

"G-G-Get away from me!"

_~Hate it as he did, he could not help himself. Dragging dead limbs, a moving zombie – How could he not do anything to slow his dying? ~_

_~On his knees, clutching the squirming rabbit in his fingers, there was no distinguishing which was more desperate – the animal in his grasp, or the last shred of humanity in his soul. ~_

"Learn to enjoy it, Zero. After the forbidden blood of the vampire royalty, infant blood is a rare and expensive delicacy. A newborn child is the closest 'pureblood' a human can be." Kaname advanced like a cobra, a glistening black poison bent on inflicting torment. Firelight danced in his eyes.

Zero hunched over, not speaking, averting his gaze for fear of looking into those heinous depths.

"No...why..."

_~He needed the blood warm, from a live body, not from dead prey. ~_

A wicked smile spread over Kaname's features like a prized scimitar slowly unsheathed. His brown, gold flecked eyes glazed over with the feral rouge colour of a rose in full bloom, beautiful and cruel with anticipation.

"Bear with it, Kiryuu-kun. It will accelerate your healing ability. You're going to need it if you want to last the night."

_~He groveled on the dirt, begging mercy for whatever judgement he would get – then, tilting his head back and holding the rabbit above his mouth, he bit into its neck. Fangs pierced the thin, fur covered neck, and its blood spurted through his desperate kissing lips. Wretched whimpers mingled with the bunny's hoarse screaming. He loathed himself. His throat convulsed with a lurid, shameful excitement.~_

_~Zero could feel a new life blossoming within his limbs. The borrowed life of a coney. ~_

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Thank you for reading! It's a little short, but for organization's sake, the next chapter will be lengthier. Please review if you want part 3, guys =)


	3. Part 3

_A/N : Heartfelt gratitude to EdenAthene; your thoughts are worth their weight in ivory and samite! =)_

Zero's thoughts : ~_Italics~_

Kaname's thoughts : _Italics_

Part 3

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_~Zero could feel a new life blossoming within his limbs. The borrowed life of a coney. ~_

"Bear with it, Kiryuu-kun. It will accelerate your healing ability. You're going to need it if you want to last the night."

Zero laughed, his voice a dissonant, delighted cackle.

_~His fingers dug into the rabbit's fur, between its ribs, inside its joints, feeling the animal's agitation in its frantic kicking and the speed of its heartbeat under his dead, grey fingers. ~_

"Kuran, you're a fool."

From the corner of his eye Zero saw Kaname toss the empty bottle of bloodwine onto the bed, followed by a glass and the porcelain bowls. A moment's tangible compression of the surrounding air, and the objects shattered, scattering their serrated shards on the silken cushions.

"A vicious, traitorous..." Zero's voice was a dead monotone, belying the wily glitter in his eyes as he stepped forward and reached around Kaname's waist, resting his palms possessively on the curve of the vampire's hips. "- desperate fool." And he ripped Kaname's tailored shirt to shreds, baring his tone physique.

Kaname grinned, and shoved.

Zero toppled backwards; it was momentarily silent, then he threw his arms back and landed on his elbows. The fragmented bits of glass and porcelain on the bed glinted wickedly, inches from his back. A sudden realization of what was to come made his throat dry with a mixture of fear and delight.

Kaname pounced like a wolverine, and quite literally, had Zero in his jaws. Straddling the boy with his knees, he rubbed his teeth over Zero's neck till the skin was red and raw, then placing his tongue over the point where his pulse hammered through his vein.

Zero struggled madly against Kaname's weight, but only succeeded in provoking him. The pureblood placed both hands on Zero's shoulders and leaned his full weight on them. Supported by Zero's arms, he relished the shaking platform on which he rested as Zero's arms shook, shoulders aching from the strain as he held them both up, as he tried to prevent his falling onto the shard covered bed.

Kaname lavished hot, sultry kisses on his long neck, snatching a shriek and a yelp when his lips reached the base of his throat. His hands snaked to Zero's chest, and snapped one nipple viciously. The younger damned him to purgatory, arms flying up uncontrollably – down he went on his back.

The bloodwine did its job – even as Zero writhed in pain and repeatedly cut his back on the unyielding shards, the skin sealed back flawlessly.

A lascivious tongue traced a slick silver burn over Zero's skin, relished the feel of stretching, tightening muscles under his tongue as Zero tossed his head, his neck straining. When Zero screamed in agony, the vibration in his vocals shivered through his skin, and the piercing treble goaded in the vampire prince a rapacious hunger that bypassed reason and went straight into lunacy. That, and the combination of the blood scent from the wet, sticky, bloody mess that was his back, shrieked at Kaname's animalistic instincts in harsh, strident tones.

It overrode years of imposed restraint, awakening in him a side he had stamped down – for very good reason.

Kaname kissed his neck with lips that burnt; Zero was sure that only the cool lingering salve of saliva prevented his raw skin from blistering – Kaname blew on a damp spot, and Zero arched _again, _mauling his back in the process –

"Zero groaned, and fresh blood soaked the sheets as he bled, healed and bled yet again.

"Kuran – " be braced his feet on the bed.

"My turn!" Zero snarled as he bucked up and flipped Kaname over and onto his back.

Kaname was furious at being subjugated, delirious - he slapped Zero across the face, threw him off.

And they were back together, tigers brawling amongst the sheets, arousing themselves with raw bestiality and violence; Zero forced Kaname face down with a brutal kick, and a piece of glass nearly sliced his nose off; the pureblood whipped around and almost tore out half of Zero's shoulder with his claws; each time their potent blood vanished the wounds rapidly, leaving their skin smooth and gleaming.

Finally Zero threw Kaname flat on his stomach and pinned him there with a knee on the small of his back. He took a fistful of thick black hair and dragged Kaname's head back, forcing that lean back to arch. There they froze, chests heaving, heartbeats an audible rapid drumming to their heightened hearing. Kaname's hair hung down in sweat slicked raven spikes, Zero's plastered back like damp silver strands.

"Fight, Kuran," Zero sneered, lowering his smiling lips to Kaname's bared fangs. "Purebloods don't lose to ex-humans. Unless they _want _something...in which case they only have to ask."

He shifted all his weight onto his knee, pressing down on Kaname's back; dragged that black head up and licked the chiselled cheek. He could feel the pureblood reigning in a growl of what must have been agony as he ground his kneecap into his spine. The scent of iron bloomed; Kaname must have lying on several large glass shards.

"You came to me, Kiriyu. I think you should be the one asking-!" a vicious jerk throttled his words to a gasp. A hand tore his pants apart.

"Oh, by all means."

Zero emphasised his point with his claws. He slammed them in just below Kaname's shoulder blades, point first and dragged them down, inhaling deeply the welling scent of life and flesh.

The glistening ivory flanks were scourged with eight valleys of virulent scarlet, and purple vulture's eyes ruminated on them with a raptor's avarice – this immortal devil was his elixir's provenance.

"I want your warmth, your strength, all of it inside me."

Kaname reared like a mongoose and sprawled Zero backward, eagle-spread on his sheets. Before Zero could recover Kaname forced his arms above his head, and fastened them to the bedpost with his shirt. Then there was a sudden coolness on his stomach as Kaname left his upper body…and the intoxicating burn of pleasure as he obligingly took him in his mouth.

Zero wrapped his legs around Kaname instinctively, his arms straining in their bonds, and stars exploded in his vision. With each strangled articulation of bliss and fury, he came closer to the edge of control. He glanced down to find an unnerving sight. There was a monster eating him up at a leisurely pace, watching him with two red coals that glowered through dark, slick hair. Rimmed by the two red ribbons that were his lips, his mouth was hot and ferocious, fettering him in a searing, insensible heat.

"Ka-AAAH!!"

The beast pulled its lips back, revealing the long teeth nestled in the hairs of Zero's length, and abruptly clamped its jaws together. Zero shrieked and thrashed in agony as blood spurted out onto his inner thighs. Ripping his hands from the restrains, Zero fisted Kaname's hair, dragged him up violently, and hollered in his face.

"Son of a bitch!"

His hair was parting from his scalp, his eyes were twisting in pain. Yet, the pureblood only smirked and showed his fangs, sharpened slivers of pearl gild in dripping crimson sheaths; he was predator, perfection, mantling his kill with spite and pitiless viciousness.

The air was thick with the raw sexual violence, the mingled scent of two dangerously aroused males. Without warning, Kaname swarmed up over Zero, skin against skin, and drove into him. Zero screamed hysterically, and Kaname's smile widened. He withdrew and plunged in again, sheathing himself to the hilt in Zero's tight, spasming heat.

Zero shrieked, electrified by the tremors that shuddered from his loins to his entire body. He was burning, breaking, and every times he was pierced, the sparkle of quicksilver and sin flung themselves through his blood. He could feel the rawness of his throat as he bellowed.

The burning tightness was ruining him, razing away his wits little by little. Kaname felt his sanity slipping, a notch and then another. He raked Zero's chest, and the smell of fresh blood drove him to a frenzied lust that had his claws and fangs lengthened.

_He never even pretended to try fighting. Escape wasn't an option, because these glass walls were not confining, they were protecting. The living cadaver swam up time and again through the bloody abyss to moon at his body. How absurd that the prince of vampires was a mere transparent screen away from rapine and butchery. Gashes for grins and pits for eyes, as remorseless as stones. None would suffer the unmolested passage of this once-prince. _

And Kaname could only continue to break into that warmth, pillaging the bloody lips for all they had.

And Zero loved it. He loved the fact that he could make this oh-so-perfect deity lose all pride and dignity, render him an insensate, rutting creature, no more a lord than the mangy alley stray mounting a bitch in heat.

"You scream," Zero hissed, holding Kaname captive with his hands. Blood dribbled from his torn lips, down the sides of his chin. The words came with difficulty; he barely had enough breath to speak. "Scream – loud – a – pureblood – whoring yourself to a – mongrel, – you damn well – have the – indecency – to – make it – known!" Gasping for breath, his words, barely audible, strained to make themselves heard.

And Kaname, with blood in his eyes and blood on his lips, the prince, the elegant lord, only growled, concerned with nothing but hitting that slick, convulsing wall over and over again. Zero gripped the wanton animal by his ear; with a supreme effort, he dragged his face close.

"Did you – hear – me?"

Kaname thrashed around, lifting one shoulder to twist out of Zero's grip, but Zero clung on adamantly. Still within Zero, the shift in position provoked a curse and made him buck off the bed entirely, lifting Kaname with him. The further movement brought sensation inconceivable to them both, inundated their bodies with a flood of flame. The change in angle was tortuous; Zero was screaming, moaning repeatedly, trapped and wriggling below the beast that had taken over Kaname.

The apostate pureblood clutched to Zero's nubile, heaving body, creating with his claws brooding, blooming spiderweb points of pain; and finally, their impious fervor culminated with the parturience of finality and exhaustion, every link of the world rocked asunder by empyrean fire.

_What time his pride had cast him out from heaven, with all his strength. _

They collapsed like the marionettes that they were, wet, sticky, discarded dolls. They had soggy lumps of pulp for bodies, and their million unseen sons were shot over their thighs and stomachs, drying and dying by the multitude.

"Tell me I live my own life," Zero begged.

_Hurled headlong flaming from ethereal sky, with hideous ruin and combustion, down to bottomless perdition, there to dwell; i__n adamantine chains and penal fire, from whence he fell – nine times the space that measures night and day, he with his horrid crew lay vanquished, rolling in the fiery gulf._

"Tell me I can choose to die," Kaname murmured. Neither replied, neither acknowledged the other. Both refused to give way.

_Confounded though immortal._

End

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The last thoughts of Kaname (_what time his pride...confounded though immortal) _were taken from John Milton's Paradise Lost...words cannot express my admiration for his works except to say : imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

On the side, this incubus of a story has been in fecundate for over a year, and I'm _exhausted_. Comments, please, guys, and criticisms are always loved and appreciated.


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